Now these are examples of Mark Twain's humour, American humour, such as
we are accustomed to expect from Mark Twain--humour not unmixed with a
strong spice of wit. But Mark Twain was capable of wit, pure and
unadulterated, curt and concise. I once saw him write in a young girl's
birthday book an aphorism which he said was one of his favourites "Truth
is our most valuable possession. Let us economize it." The advice he
once gave me as to the proper frame of mind for undergoing a surgical
operation has always remained in my memory: "Console yourself with the
reflection that you are giving the doctor pleasure, and that he is
getting paid for it." Peculiarly memorable is his forthright dictum
that the statue which advertises its modesty with a fig-leaf brings its
modesty under suspicion. His business motto--unfortunately, a motto
that he never followed--has often been attributed, because of its canny
shrewdness, to Mr. Andrew Carnegie. The idea was to put all your eggs
in one basket--and then--watch that basket! His anti-Puritanical
convictions find concrete expression in his assertion that few things
are harder to put up with than the annoyance of a good example. Truly
classic, in usage if not in form, is his happy saying that faith is
believing what you know ain't so. His definition of a classic as a book
which people praise but don't read, is as frequently heard as are
Biblical and Shakespearian tags.

Mr. Clemens once told me that he had composed between two and three
hundred maxims during his life. Many of them, especially those from the
old and new calendars of Pudd'nhead Wilson, bear the individual and
peculiar stamp of Mark Twain's phraseology and outlook upon life
--quaint, genial, and shrewd. In pursuance of his deep-rooted belief in
the omnipotent power of training, he remarked that the peach was once a
bitter almond, the cauliflower nothing but cabbage with a college